Surviving Job Rejection: 3 lessons from the Oscars

The curtain has just fallen on The 2017 Oscars, and boy, oh boy, was it a doozy. Mix-ups, mishaps and mayhem were the themes of the night, with the main one being La La Land mistakenly being given the Best Picture Oscar. Whoops!

But, mistakes happen. Sometimes, you don’t win and sometimes you are rejected.

Job seekers know this better than anyone! Unless you are very lucky, dealing with rejection is part and parcel of the job hunt journey. Although it can disheartening, a job rejection doesn’t have to be a big disaster - how you get past it and overcome it is what is important.

So, let’s take a few rejection and survival tips from the year’s craziness at The Oscars to see what we can learn!

We get it, you’re annoyed

In what was maybe a bit of an upset at this year’s Oscar’s, Casey Affleck walked away with the Best Actor trophy for Manchester By The Sea, ahead of people like Andrew Garfield (Hacksaw Ridge), Ryan Gosling (La La Land), Viggo Mortensen (Captain Fantastic), and Denzel Washington (Fences).

It’s never nice losing out to someone else (especially if you think that person doesn’t deserve the win for maybe a few reasons…) but if you do, do a Denzel:

It’s a mostly stoic, only slightly annoyed expression that says a million things without saying them at all.

The lesson? Even if you think you’re a shoo-in for that job you interviewed for, anything can happen. You don’t always know who you’re up against, and you have no real way of knowing what the outcome will be. There’s no point kicking and screaming if things turn out against you. After all, you can’t change the outcome...

...Or can you?

Accept your fate

Oh, Warren Beatty. It wasn’t your fault. You were handed the wrong card to read! But seriously, have you ever seen something so crazy happen at such a long-running, prestigious awards ceremony?

Yep, in case you missed it, La La Land was incorrectly announced as Best Picture. The actual winner was Moonlight, and the above clip doesn’t show half the awkwardness that was probably felt from all the La La Land crew on stage. What this clip does shows, though, is humility and grace, after La La Land producer Jordan Horowitz realised the mistake that was made.

Instead of being angry about the statue being taken away from him, he said:

“I’m gonna be really proud to hand this to my friends from Moonlight”.

The lesson? Be humble. You won’t always get what you want - or even deserve - but people will always remember how you handled yourself during the process. If you don’t get the job, accept it and move on. Take your learnings from the whole ordeal and apply yourself to the next available role you really want. Onwards and upwards!

Find support

Whether you’ve made a mistake or been let down during a job search, chances are someone else has experienced the exact same thing: